Five things Slaven Bilic needs to fix at West Ham over the international break

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With the first international break of the season now upon us, it gives Slaven Bilic some brief respite from the enormous pressure he is under and a chance to fix some glaring problems at West Ham.

The Hammers have handed out three straight defeats to kick off the Premier League season and head into the break firmly rooted to the bottom of the Premier League table and already playing catch up.

The latest was a dire 3-0 reverse at Newcastle United on Saturday which has seen the Hammers fans start to turn on Bilic after just three wins in the past 17 games across two seasons.

There are a number of problems for the manager to try and sort out over the next 14 days before the Hammers are back in action for their first home game of the season against Huddersfield Town under the lights in E20.

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Find a settled centre back pairing

Winston Reid should be back from injury by the time the Terriers game comes around and he is the best centre back the club has, so Bilic needs to find a partner for him.

It looks likely to be Angelo Ogbonna but Bilic has deployed three different centre back pairings so far this season, with Ogbonna the one constant. if that’s his central defensive pairing, he needs to stick with it and not chop and change.

Forever blowing bubbles (Image: Dan Mullan/Getty Images)

The injury to Reid certainly didn’t help but when he is back and if both stay fit – Bilic needs to keep with it. There’s nothing stopping him from signing another centre back in the next couple of days if he’s really unsure and gets rid of Jose Fonte to Crystal Palace as well.

Sort a formation that suits Javier Hernandez

The tactic of lumping long balls to Chicharito simply isn’t going to work and is only going to leave the Mexican superstar completely frustrated.

Bilic needs to find the right formation to suit his star striker – if that means playing Diafra Sakho alongside him then so be it – especially when Marko Arnautovic returns from his ban.

Hernandez was brought in to guarantee goals but he isn;t going to score as many as hoped if the team isn’t playing to his strengths.

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Slaven Bilic

Team selection

Bilic needs to be picking his strongest available 11 every week, it was criminal that at least Obiang wasn’t in the team for Newcastle. Kouyate was coming back from injury but had minutes against Cheltenham.

Bilic needs to start picking his strongest team every week to get the club out of the mess they are in and he needs to decide what that team is over the international break.

(Image: Julian Finney/Getty Images)

Get the players to find a backbone

The team crumbled in the closing stages against Manchester United and didn’t even turn up against Newcaslte, they need to sort that out.

The payers showed what they are capable of when they went down to ten-men against Southampton but it should take going 2-0 down and a man down for them to do that.

Whether Bilic has full command of the dressing room or not, he needs to give them all a rocket and gee them up. They need to start fighting every game, not just when they are in adversity on the pitch.

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Get Manuel Lanzini’s future sorted

If the club lost the Argentine then it would be nothing short of a disaster.

West Ham have tied down Obiang, Michail Antonio, Winston Reid and Angelo Ogbonna to long-term deals but Lanzini’s is still being discussed. In fact, it’s not been offered yet.

Even if Bilic isn’t the manager after this season, he can at least leave a legacy by getting the Jewel to sit down and sign a new, long-term contract with the club because if he goes, any creativity in the side goes with him.